Week 567- Superfluous Quotation Marks

The Introduction

This is my first wrap of 2026. A few weeks away have made me flabby because I am unnaturally lazy. Therefore, like an athlete gone to seed, I will pull on the sweats and attempt to get in shape by writing about small pointless items and work my way into good enough form to intelligently write about this week’s group of stories. All within a few paragraphs. I aim to put a point on pointless, to sharpen its, well, pointy, or at least pointier end, then use it to etch profound wisdom on the corbomite* walls of public inanity. (*Extremely hard and potentially explosive fictional mass invented by Captain James T. Kirk, known associate of Hardcourt Fenton Mudd, a suspected interstellar Jeffrey Epstein of the 23rd Century.)

A Pointless Resolution

Last year I vowed to cut back on use of the exclamation point. Although I continue to struggle with just where plugging one in is too much, I feel I have made some bastard version of progress. I am the sort of person who starts, fails, restarts, re-fails; this tendency often makes me guilty of “progress” because I do not know when to give up.

Yet it is in our attempts at self improvement that cause ignored shortcomings to tug at our hems and remind us that they too need attention. I, admittedly, am long on shortcomings. One of which is using quotation marks, as with “progress” in the above paragraph, and again, here, to alter the meaning of a word (maybe I should consider comma pruning as well), usually done to place said word under a facetious light.

Actually I see nothing wrong with that useful tool except when it is driven to a state of threadbareness by over use. The same goes with italics (deciding between quotation marks and italics is one of the many small banes of my existence, along with frequent parenthetical inclusions). But I figure that I can make an effort to improve just about anything I do, in case there is a watchful Heaven keeping score. So from here on I will produce fewer superfluous quotation marks. It’s not your win loss record Heaven is concerned with, but the effort–along with kissing God’s Immense Ass.

Topic Switch: A Pointless Criminal Activity

Yes, indeedy, self improvement is almost always a worthy pursuit. But there are the exceptions, I mean no one should be improving her/his serial killing procedures, yet there are criminals so woefully pathetic that you feel they should try a little harder.

Witness this excerpt from an email I received three times despite all attempts to spam it; my spam/scam filter is about as dominant as a Hobbit basketball team.

The sender is named “Michael” (shit another resolution already shot to hell). Behold:

“…try to understand me Irrene [sic]. Listen to me because I am not telling this to deceive you….We have received a directive from the executive house to deposite [sic] your compensation fund of $80 millions of US funds into Us [sic] bank from them to issue you a cheque…”

I pray to God that I should be dead long before I get senile enough to take such shit seriously. The thing goes on and is consistently laughable.

At least I can unabashedly insult this thieving meatball for his lack of morals and general cluelessness because he can hardly sue me. But I find myself feeling sorry for him to the point that I wondered if it was a gag of some type. I googled recent spam scams and sure enough “Michael” has been flagged dozens of times. The same lame email, the same mindless Rat bastard persistence (three times before the wall held or he gave up), which again makes me despair also for the intelligence level of the Good Guys (who appear to be the “Slow Horses” of the tech world) because this sub-moronic and evil “Michael” is able to get around their blocks.

A Topic Movement: An Honest Moment of Respect

Author James Grauerholz died on 1 January at age seventy-two. He wrote, but was much more responsible for the legacy and care of William S. Burroughs (including taking the old sinner to the methadone clinic every week for sixteen years). Mr. Grauerholz did as much, and likely more, than anyone to keep Burroughs in the public eye and perhaps from dying much sooner, and likely alone and in squalor, than at the astronomical junker age of eighty-three in 1997 (for a regular person that is like seeing five hundred). James Grauerholz deserves to be remembered if only for seeing to the proper loving care of Burroughs collection of Cats after WSB left Kansas for keeps. So, that will happen here.

Another Topic Change (actually the first change, the previous were a switch chased by a movement): A Moment of Pointless Clarity

I stopped writing this post, lit a smoke, somebody spoke and I fell into a dream. It amazes me how often Beatles’ lyrics “catch me out” (damn, more quoties). I mean there I was writing about my overuse of quotation marks, then I got drowsy and slipped into a strange mishmash of self improvement, remembering poorly written criminal activity and briefly eulogizing a worthwhile person–at the same time operating on the specious notion that I was working myself into a mentally fit and steely-eyed writer; yet I must admit I haven’t had enough workout time to reach the wit of a Steelhead Salmon. Oh yes, some gains have been, no denying that (although I am most likely to backslide, and soon). And I feel I have done a good deed alerting fellow beings to the nefarious master criminal Michael, and nudging the worthy memory of James Grauerholz into the mix–yet everything feels so empty, it is as though there are more phantoms than operas and still way too many Osmonds and Osbournes (no disrespect–a term used to foretell incoming disrespect–but the only talented one of the latter also has passed). Yet even though I am hardly up to the task, let us proceed with the remembrance of the Week That Was and pray that a little leftover holiday elf dust is around to take off the edge.

This past Sunday, Dale Williams Barrigar took us on a roadtrip. For those of you unfamiliar with the United States, riding the wide open highway in search of adventure has always been a beguiling thing. Whether it be by covered wagon or on a Harley tooling down Route 66, the lore and temptation and danger of the highway beckons. And although (as it has been noted by many) the freeway has made it possible for one to drive the full three thousand miles without seeing a goddam thing, there are off ramps and as always, one is only limited by her imagination. Roadhouse Blues is more first rate work by DWB. The pressure to maintain his high standard has not been a problem for Dale whatsoever. In fact, he seems to be improving.

(R.I.P. Bob Weir who passed shortly after this was written; may he and his ghostly comrades truly be Grateful Dead)

Anyway,

Monday brought Missing by return author Kayla Cain. Here is another writer whose works continue to grow. If one is familiar with the old saying about “little ears and big pitchers” then the theme of Kayla’s tale will make great sense to you. This one takes a clever approach and the result is quite satisfying.

Geraint Jonathan is as deft a wordsmith as anyone desires. His blend of wit, humour and often non-linear writing is always entertaining, and even if he confuses you I think you should still find him interesting. Installation checks all the boxes, so to speak. And although it can be a horrifying thing to consider, Geraint has leavened this short piece with his usual wit.

And She Was by the week’s first newcomer to the site, Jordan Eve Morral is a meaningful exploration of the often meaningless of being. It is sad, slightly absurd and changes gears in a way that keeps the reader on her/his heels. It truly is a fine bit of work and we hope to see more from her soon.

Thursday saw The Sun Rose in the West, which is the second appearance by Stephen J Kimber. This is another brutal yet human look at the world. Utterly compelling it manages to get past the disheartening elements of the story and create its own little universe, which is always indicative of first rate composition.

And we closed the week with Pennsylvania Man by Tony Gordino. Tony is the week’s second first time contributor and certainly another we want to see return. Although the stories this week all differ in style, each one has the same human element to it whether it is hard boiled (which can be argued as the case here), alone, hopeless, freewheeling or absurd. The repeat of the order at the end of this one snaps the case shit, tidy and clear.

There we have the performers of another Week That Was. If you haven’t had the chance to read all of them yet, I strongly encourage you to do so.

The Medium Sized Finish

I conclude with a list of ten fictional items that I believe were good but somehow, for me, missed being great. I am sure to be alone on some of these topics, but what the obla dee, obla dah…

• The White Album-Beatles (so many great songs, but the project always feels disjointed when compared to Pepper and Abby Road).
• Godfather Part II-(It has not held up as well as the original, which might be a perfect film. Still pretty good, it ends, for me, with a sigh, which may be appropriate yet still a let down. If not for Bobby D. playing young Vito I think it would have not been much good).
• The Sons of Anarchy (Great show except for the final season. For years it had a sense of humour, but none toward the end. And at the end there were no surprises at all, just a lot of people getting shot in the head, oh, and sodomized. Kurt Sutter seems to have a thing for prison rape. Also the lead character, Jax, was a murderer who did stuff like shoot a female character in the head simply because she reminded him of his mother–but understand this, damn it, he was neither homophobic nor racist. I figure if you write about outlaw white bikers you have to face the facts of life and can the p.c. stuff; that stuff was embarrassingly bad and pissed me off because I was all in for six years)
• The X Files (It needed to wrap when Duchovny walked after season seven. Robert Patrick is a fine actor, but it was clear that the producers stuck out a couple more years for money)
• It-Stephen King (Don’t get me wrong, It was a success, but I believe it could have been the greatest horror novel ever if King could have thought up a better “real” form of Pennywise than a Spider. Of course that was/is a hell of a tall challenge, but being the greatest ever requires that sort of accomplishment. Indeed this was caused by my own expectations as I read it. I was expecting the Evil of all Evils and felt a bit slighted by what I got, and I give SK credit for trying and for not copping out and saying it was too mysterious and evil to describe, although I think that’s still would have been better than the Arachnid. Still, I strongly recommend the book (in my opinion his second best after The Stand), but if he could have somehow conjured the unthinkable, it would have been The Masterpiece of Horror–oh, and I would have rather seen Eddie’s wife get killed instead of him, but that’s just me).
• Shooting Star–song by Bad Company. (I have endlessly argued that the solo is in the wrong place. It should come after “listen to the wind and you can still hear him play.” Damn it.)
• Here Comes the Sun-Beatles. (Would be one of the greatest songs ever, but I absolutely hate the “doo-doo doo-woot doo.” Everyone who covers that either limits or omits it. I wish George had done the same).
• Quatermass first two films–(cool budget flicks, but the miscasting of Brian Donlevy as the great scientist detracts from them. He was a good actor, but very American and just not right for the part; if they wanted an American they should have called Vincent Price)
• Futrurama (A good show that could have been great if Fox had let it have the same amount of time they gave to both The Simpsons and Family Guy to develop. I really liked it and am still pissed that it got pulled way too soon. I also feel that way about the original Star Trek. I would have loved to seen what they could have done with more than just three seasons)
• All Yours

Today’s clip is brought to you by my Unsteady Jukebox, when the Dion rendition of the following song played the other day, I recalled this one by Moms Mabley. Moms had a long hard climb to fame–her life beginning with being raped and having a child at eleven (the situation was repeated when she was fourteen), but she did more than hang in there, therefore she deserves to be remembered. The following is a rare serious turn by the lady.

And this for Mr. Weir

Leila